


a touch too close

by theleftboobgrabber



Series: Tumblr fics [11]
Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: Declarations Of Love, First Kiss, M/M, Soft Eddie Diaz, Soft Evan "Buck" Buckley, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-27
Updated: 2020-06-27
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:27:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24938275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theleftboobgrabber/pseuds/theleftboobgrabber
Summary: @hearteyesforbuck wanteda fic where Buck accidentally kisses Eddie on the neck while he hugs him and that’s how feelings are confessed.Eddie was always in his space, and Buck was always in his. Piled up on couches; pressed close at the diner table, forearms touching, glued from thigh to ankle; hugging hello and goodbyes; shoving at each other after a shower; always a hand on each other back, shoulder, waist; always touching.And it had been fine. Great. Until it turned too much.
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV)
Series: Tumblr fics [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/446650
Comments: 65
Kudos: 666





	a touch too close

**Author's Note:**

  * For [elisela](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elisela/gifts).



Buck has always been tactile. 

He’s a hugger, sue him. Or really, sue Maddie. She’s the one that hugged him, comforted him, patted his head, held his hands and carried him everywhere. Bestest sister ever, stepping up ‘cause their parents were… not parents. Roommates was a more apt definition, and distant ones at that. Maddie did not want that for him and gave him what she never had.

And she turned him into a needy hugger.

He knows it doesn’t make everyone super comfortable to be touched like that. Only girlfriends were happy about it really, but Buck needed to be close to everyone. In college, frat houses were full of bros that hugged and wrestled and passed their arms around your shoulders, but it was always quick, there and gone. Unfulfilling. The seals had been the same, just like the Fire Academy.

Physical form of affection, of camaraderie, it always has a timer between men. More was suspicious. More was gay. More was bad.

So Buck curbed down any need to cuddle with his friends, kept a timer running in his head during hugs, shoved his hands deep in his pockets and kept them there during parties instead of letting roams on backs and shoulders.

(touch starved, that’s what he was)

Men, Buck found, were really fragile when it came to touch other men and what it could mean.

And then he met Eddie Diaz, who hugged without a countdown in his head, his entire body engulfing you in a tight, heart melting embrace.

Eddie was always in his space, and Buck was always in his. Piled up on couches; pressed close at the diner table, forearms touching, glued from thigh to ankle; hugging hello and goodbyes; shoving at each other after a shower; always a hand on each other back, shoulder, waist; _always touching_.

And it had been fine. Great. Until it turned too much.

Because Buck has stopped being Eddie’s friend a while ago. Friends might hold hands, might cuddle, but Buck’s been dreaming of kissing Eddie and their joined hands too much, of holding him, sated and naked in bed. Of keeping him and Chris forever.

Buck didn’t want to hold Eddie as a friend.

It was not fair to either himself or Eddie to feel or mean different things when they hugged.

*

“Hey hey, Eddie wait, you forgot your wallet!” Buck calls after him, running into the street his apartment building is on to catch Eddie before he gets in his truck and drives away.

They had just had a movie night without Chris, finally finding time to watch something else than Disney movies.

(Too close on the couch, touching from shoulder to calf, so damn warm Buck has been sweating the entire time)

Not twenty feet from his truck, Eddie turns around, frowning at Buck running toward him, already patting himself, vest, front of his jeans, back pockets, eyebrows knitted together. “ _Fuck_.”

Buck stops in front of him, handing him the wallet with a flourish and a smirk. “You forgot your bag at the station this morning, now it’s your wallet...” he points out, “your head is next if you keep at this.”

“I have you to remind me,” Eddie says, shaking his head and taking the wallet from Buck, fingers touching, before showing it in his back pocket. “Thank you Buck. and sorry. I know I’m- distracted.” 

“Yeah, I noticed,” Buck nods, glad for the yellow tinted street lighting washing away the evidence of his blush at Eddie’s words. _I have you,_ Eddie said, and he’s right of course. _You have me more than you know, Eddie. More than you want_. Buck swallows down the familiar tasting pain of wanting too much from Eddie (from anyone he ever loved really). “Something on your mind? Someone?” he teases. Even the concept of Eddie with someone else hurts, but it’s a good distraction, and Buck… Buck loves Eddie enough that he wants him happy more than anything.

Eddie’s head shoots up, eyes wild, _caught_. 

And oh. That’s… Buck didn’t expect to hit bullseye, but… of course. Eddie wasn’t going to stay single forever to spare Buck’s poor hopeless heart.

“Good,” he forces out, shoving his hands in the back pocket of his jeans. “You deserve to be happy.”

Eddie… Eddie doesn’t look happy. He looks _bitter_. “I do. Don’t think it’s in the cards, though.”

“Then she’s stupid,” Buck snaps, too honest, iron grip on his jealous slipping.

Eddie shakes his head. God, he must love her a lot. “No. It’s just- complicated.”

Buck nods again, hands balling up into fist in his pockets, keeping them away from Eddie, from touching him.

(Anticipatory loss. He needs to touch, to take his impossible fill, because soon he won’t be able)

“Well. When you wanna tell me more, I’ll be all ears,” he assures. It’ll hurt like a bitch, though.

Eddie snorts. The sad kind. “You’ll be the first to know.”

And then, before Buck can step away and turn around to get back to his building door, to the safety of his apartment so he can break apart, Eddie’s on him, hugging him for dear life.

“Hey, hey, Eddie- you’re okay?” Buck asks, arms automatically going around Eddie’s waist, holding him as close, as hard. They already hugged goodbye at the door when Eddie left, already checked Buck’s twice a day hug allowance, but Eddie obviously needs this, so Buck can break his own rules just this once.

“I’ll be.” And he sounds so sad, so unbearably exhausted, Buck keeps him in his arms, swaying him a little like Maddie used to do for him when he was upset. 

They stay like this for a while, probably forcing people to side step them on the sidewalk but that’s not important and Buck… forgets himself. The countdown in his head silent, overwhelmed and drowned by Eddie’s warmth, the way his fists are bunching up in the fabric of Buck’s shirt and the way he smells, _God_ , clean sweet, woody cologne and that something that is just simply _Eddie_ that drives Buck half mad when they’re close.

And how fucked up is that, that Buck can’t give his best friend some comfort without his heart giving out because he wants this to mean more?

(so, so fucked up)

Eddie makes a sound, weak and distressed and Buck… Buck _reacts_ , holding him closer, forehead pressing against the side of his head, _I’m here I’m here_ , whispered or wished, and that damn cologne, following it source with his nose, with his lips, finding Eddie’s neck and- just there.

All the soft things that Eddie are, that he deserves, that Buck’s just begging to give him, precious and just right there, under Buck’s lips.

“Bu-Buck? What are-” Eddie startles in his arms, shaking Buck awake-

 _No no no no no no no, what did-_ Buck jumps away, shame ringing in his head, nausea rising, rising in his throat, _God what did I do?!-_

Eddie’s frozen, arms still raised a little from where he was hugging Buck, before Buck _abused it_.

“Eddie, I’m sorry, I didn’t-” he chokes on the words, sting of shame and tears in his eyes. He feels like running, but… he can’t. He has to explain, has to apologize. “I didn’t mean-”

But Eddie’s got this expression on his face that shuts him up: Eyebrows high on his forehead, mouth slightly open, arms still slightly raised, ready to get Buck inside the circle of them. “You kissed- me. _You kissed me_ ,” Eddie says in wonder, accusatory tone nowhere to be found. “You-”

“Eddie I-”

“You’re someone,” Eddie whispers.

“Uh, what?”

“You’re _someone_. On my mind. Messing with my head,” Eddie stammers. “You’re- I like you!”

And that doesn’t make a lot of sense, because even in Buck’s most self indulgent fantasy, Eddie had to be wooed and showed how good Buck would be for him. Never, _never_ Buck had imagined Eddie could be… pinning after him.

“What,” he says intelligently, floored and- and- _how?!_

“Buck, how can that be a surprise? I’m all over you!” Eddie shouts back at him, gesturing wildly between the two of them before taking a step toward him.

Buck steps back. “You’re a hugger!” he retorts. This isn’t his life, however how much he wants it to be.

“No, _I’m really not_. You- Buck I’m not,” Eddie assures him. “Who do I hug beside you? I just… can’t help myself with you.”

And yes… okay. Eddie’s only that tactil with Buck but- unless- 

“Oh.” _This is my life._

“Yeah. _Oh,” Eddie repeats, something so soft in his eyes Buck takes a step forward._ “And you kissed me,” Eddie’s blinking wonder and… tears out of his eyes. “On the neck. I’m someone on your mind.”

“You’re more than that,” Buck says, feeling stupid. “So much more.”

Eddie laughs, a happy sound that makes Buck want to bottle for rainy days. “Now can you- can you get your ass over there because I-”

Buck’s on him in a second, hugging him hard, face hidden in his neck, fingers digging in the supple leather of his jacket. “We should-”

“Yep,” Eddie laughs again, “inside.”

They don’t move for a while, and when they do, Buck’s caught in Eddie’s soft eyes. “I always- I always wanted to do that. Every time we hug it’s- it’s a fucking struggle not to take more.”

Eddie shakes his head, taking Buck’s hand in his, fingers intertwined. “It’s freely given. Trust me, I want you-”

Buck kisses him, right there in the street, right on the lips, quick and gone and knocking their forehead together, breathing in Eddie’s contented sigh. 

“I want you back,” he says, following his nose and rubbing it against Eddie’s pulse point he kissed earlier.

Against him, Eddie shivers. “Never stop doing that.”

_I won’t._

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> If you loved it, kudos and comments are ALWAYS a good way to show it, here, on [tumblr](http://theleftboobgrabber.tumblr.com/) and [twitter](https://twitter.com/AngryGuii)! Check my [fic tag](https://theleftboobgrabber.tumblr.com/tagged/w) for updates and rambling :)
> 
> Feedback is love ❤


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